I came across Draginol's article regarding the left's blinding hatred of our esteemed President today, and decided that it would be necessary to toss in my two coppers. I'm not really going to address his particular article specifically, as his article was simply the impetus for my considering my dislike for our President. I'd rather begin my stint here as a neophyte blogger as politely as possible.
I think a little bit of information about myself will help in putting my opinions in the proper perspective. I apologize in advance for any run-on sentences or poor grammar, as I am watching TV while I do this, and this is simply to get some ideas down on virtual paper.
I grew up in North Carolina, son of a larger-than-small business owner and farmer in a moderately well-to-do family. Southern Baptist from the day my mother brought me home from the hospital, I wouldn't exactly categorize myself as the prototypical leftist. In fact, throughout my adolescence and young adulthood, I was known quite infamously throughout not only my high school and the surrounding areas as quite the antithesis thereof. My parents were co-chairpeople of the Franklin County Republican party, and remained quite active within the party until my father's health began to falter. A great cause of this failing health was a direct result of his 50+ years of heavy smoking (although I am quite sure that the major tobacco companies would disagree vehemently on that bit of information).
In addition to being quite politically conservative from the womb, I discovered a love of the political discourse (or what at that time I mistook for political discourse) and became a formidable debater and enormous fan of conservative national personalities such as Rush Limbaugh and Pat Buchanan, and an ardent supporter of all things Republican, whether right or wrong. In retrospect, I honestly believed that the conservative rhetoric more than compensated for any behavioral gaffes, e.g. Iran Contra, Watergate, etc., that may or may have not been perpetuated by said political animals.
I graduated from high school with a stellar academic record (ranked 7th if I remember correctly) in my class, and also a letterman in two sports, as well as having earned my Eagle rank in the Boy Scouts of America. While in the Boy Scouts and living on a farm my whole life, I gained a deep respect for both small farmers and ecological conservation. Was I a tree-hugger or enviro-nazi? No... just a God-fearing Southern boy who loved being able to wake up in the morning and take a deep lungful of wonderfully sweet North Carolina fescue-tinged air.
Having applied to numerous colleges and universities, I decided upon Duke University as my future educational facility and while there, proceeded to study political science and history, economics and German, philosophy and religion with a vengance. In fact, once I got to college, I began to realize through my own reading (certainly not through the prescribed reading by my professors) that there was a whole new world of worldly perspective out there. Contrary to much of what I had heard on Rush's show, for example, at least at Duke University, the education was surprisingly conservative and decidedly traditional. Had I relied on only my educational materials for my classes, my perspective most likely would have remained much as it had before... reactionary, conservative, and Republican.
However, during my junior year in college, I moved to Berlin, Germany for a semester program abroad. A new world opened before my eyes, and my perspective on world events and history grew and developed at an almost meteoric rate. Needless to say, my views started to change in favor of a more cosmopolitan and worldly view. Does that mean that I became a pabulum-puking liberal, as Morton Downey, Jr. so eloquently described? (thank you for correcting me, Anthony R. However, next time, do you think you could offer some constructive criticism, or is that perhaps a little too far beyond your intellectual capacity?) Quite the opposite, actually. In fact, if it weren't for my Christian background and my belief in the teachings of Christ that, first and foremost, one is to love his neighbor as himself, I would probably have become a cold-hearted asshole. Instead, I became a warm-hearted asshole. Just kidding.
Anyway, throughout this time, my dad was getting sicker, and even though he is a veteran of Korea (you remember Korea, the war that really wasn't a war?) and fought proudly for his country in the Army and always paid his taxes, he was turned away for aid through the VA. To compound matters, he was also declined for disablity benefits, even though he was rightfully entitled to those benefits.
Due to my father's health, my family moved west to Texas while I was still in college. This happened to be in 1996. Throughout my stint in Germany, my folks lived in Texas. And let me tell you, being that my parents had been lifetime Republicans, when they finally arrived to the "Republican paradise" that is Texas, they were sorely disappointed. This brings me to the whole reason for this submittal to my blog. I graduated from Duke University in the spring of 1998, and promptly moved out to Texas to be with my family.
Much of what we all heard about Texas during the 2000 campaign regarding all of the wonderful changes and improvements to the Lone Star state was simply... well, let me just call it what it was... Bullshit. The educational advances that had supposedly occured? Didn't happen. The improvements in the ecological situation in Texas? Nonexistent. The reduction in the real tax rate on everyday Joe Texan? Never came to pass. In fact, on pretty much every issue and "victory" that Bush proposed as a feather in his proverbial resume cap, he was lying. For exact numbers, I could sit here and crib from numerous reports and studies and books that have been authored. That isn't the intent of this article. To be honest, Molly Ivins is much more articulate than I am, and certainly a hell of a lot funnier. Instead, the intent behind this article is simply to let you know how it felt on the ground, as we were living it, before any numbers or articles or studies had been done. Having just graduated from college, and being a pretty sharp guy as politics and economics is concerned as well as having been raised to be extremely politically conservative, it felt like somebody (Bush) was lying to the world, and using our pitiful economic and social situation in Texas as reasoning for putting Bush in power. We felt betrayed with regards to our support and our beliefs.
Now don't get me wrong. Bush, I'm sure, is a nice guy. He doesn't really want to hurt anybody. If only he knew what his policies, or the policies of his appointees and underlings were ACTUALLY doing, things would be different. The problem with this is simply that it's bullshit as well. First, that sort of thinking is precisely the type mental exercize that your average German citizen under the Nazis enganged in. Am I comparing Bush to the Nazis? No. What I am doing is simply illustrating how a people under stress will dupe themselves into justifying or explaning away something that doesn't quite fit into what they have come to believe. Actually, most people who know the Bush family in Texas know that Dubya is a spiteful, spoiled brat who is a complete asshole. Now granted, this is heresay, as I don't personally know George W. Bush. But I know what he says in public. I know what the realities on the ground in Texas are for a middle class family (not just my own, might I add). And I know personally quite a few people who have had a number of dealings with Bush personally whose opinions I value highly.
So to recap. Why do I dislike Bush? Simple. He lies, he holds others to standards to which he won't hold himself, and he lies. He lies, he lies, he lies. And that flies in the face of everything I was ever taught as a Christian.
In case anyone is wondering, this is off the top of my head, without any preplanning. SO if you have a problem with my line of reasoning, I'll clean it up and add some more flesh to this, as well as do some editing in the near future. I just wanted to respond. Let me know what you think?